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Rui Pedro case: 13 years later, a breakthrough

Rui Pedro: Main suspect accused of abduction, but accusation does not allow to know what happened to the youngster – lawyer

The main suspect in the disappearance of Rui Pedro, 13 years ago, has been accused of the crime of abduction, but according to the family’s lawyer, this accusation does not allow to know what happened to the youngster, or if he is alive or dead.

According to Ricardo Sá Fernandes, the Public Ministry’s accusation has been formalised on the 11th of February, but it was only today that the accused – Afonso Dias – was notified.

Lusa has spoken to Afonso Dias, who did not make any comment on the issue.
According to Ricardo Sá Fernandes, the work of a new Polícia Judiciária (PJ) team in Oporto has contributed to bring this accusation forward, as they “managed to reconstruct what happened during the 24 hours after Rui Pedro’s disappearance”.
In order to do that, depositions were taken into account and reconstitutions were carried out, which allowed to reconstruct “those fundamental hours” which, for the lawyer, “were at the origin of the disappearance”.

“Basically, what we have here is a team that was now able to investigate and to draw the due conclusions out of facts that should have been established right after Rui Pedro’s disappearance”, said Ricardo Sá Fernandes, who believes that the former “investigation did not investigate”.

“During the 48 hours that followed the disappearance, the investigation failed to respect basic procedures and led to weeks, months, years going by with nothing being done”, he accused.

This news’ impact on Rui Pedro’s mother, who never gave up searching for her son, and even built a website in 2007, telling the story of her son’s abduction, hoping to find him, was such that she is in no condition of commenting on the case for now.

Rui Pedro was last seen on the 4th of March of 1998, in Lousada, when he was aged eleven.

I heard on TVI lunch time news that the Teixeira family is not going to issue any comment on the recent developments in order not to cause any possible damage to the investigation. What a sensible attitude and what a demonstration of self-control! They could very well be all over the media, pointing the finger at the PJ and the inneficient investigation team that dealt with the case back in 1998, but, they remain silent. I don't know if I would be able of such restraint, and I feel they have all the reasons in the world to dragg the portuguese state to court on this failure of 13 years!